Erik Jones isn’t just another name in the garage. He’s been a standout since his teenage years, bursting onto the scene with serious swagger. Back in 2013, at just 17, he outran Kyle Busch in the Truck Series at Phoenix, becoming the youngest winner in that series’ history.

That victory set the tone: a kid unfazed by the big dogs, ready to make his mark. From there, Jones climbed fast, snagging the 2015 Truck Series championship with Kyle Busch Motorsports and then tearing it up in Xfinity with Joe Gibbs Racing. By 2017, he was the Cup Series Rookie of the Year, driving for Furniture Row Racing’s second team, proving he could hang with the best.

His career’s had some serious highlights. In 2018, Jones conquered the Coke Zero Sugar 400 at Daytona and bagged the Southern 500 at Darlington in 2019, one of NASCAR’s crown jewels. He doubled down in 2022, winning Darlington again for Petty GMS (now Legacy Motor Club), delivering the Petty family’s 200th win and their first in eight years. That night was pure magic, cementing Jones as a driver who can deliver when it counts. But consistency’s been the hurdle. Now with Legacy Motor Club, Jones’s 2025 season has been a grind, with flashes of speed overshadowed by frustrating finishes. Recently, Jones got real about his struggles, offering a candid take on where he’s at and what’s next for a driver still chasing his prime.

Jones gets real on Cup Series struggles

Sitting down on NASCAR Live, Erik Jones didn’t sugarcoat things, “Well it’s never easy as a driver right? Because you’re competitive and you’ve done this well, you know I’ve done this for a while and you want to see those results and I feel like I’m at a good spot in my career experience and age-wise where I feel like I should be able to really you know, run well and take advantage of some success that we can have with our cars.”

At 29, with nine full Cup seasons under his belt, Jones is in his prime, but 2025’s been rough with no wins, no poles, and just two top-fives through 25 races. Legacy Motor Club’s been pouring in effort since its 2023 rebrand, but the team has yet to match the consistency of NASCAR’s elite, leaving Jones frustrated despite the hard work.

He went on, “We go to Indy and we’re super fast and things don’t work out in the race obviously. But we have the speed and then you go to you know Richmond and we’re struggling and just not where we want to be. So it’s always the roller coaster in the Cup Series and that’s no different for anybody.”

That roller coaster is brutal. At the Brickyard 400, Jones qualified second and had real speed, but a wheel shearing off on Lap 89 sent him crashing to a 36th-place finish. At Richmond, he limped to 26th, two laps down. Those swings, blazing pace one week and nowhere the next, sum up the inconsistency that’s dogging him and Legacy.

Still, he’s keeping the faith, “But it still isn’t something that happens overnight, so you know we’ll keep building out. We got 11 more races this year. Like I said, you can win one race and all of a sudden you think about your year a lot different than what you did before. So there’s still a lot of optimism, at least for me.”

Jones knows one win can flip the script. His 2022 Darlington triumph turned a tough season into a historic moment for Petty. Even after setbacks, like a points penalty at Martinsville in 2025 for an underweight car, costing him 18 points and eight spots in the standings, Jones sees the potential. With 11 races left, he’s banking on a spark to redefine his year.

Legacy’s legal battles heat up

Off the track, Jones’s team is caught in a messy web of lawsuits over NASCAR’s charter system. Legacy Motor Club is tangled in three of the five ongoing charter disputes, including a big one against Rick Ware Racing. Legacy claims they had a signed deal to buy a 2026 charter from RWR, but RWR countersued, alleging Legacy is trying to snag a different charter than agreed.

Then there’s T.J. Puchyr, who reportedly agreed to buy all of RWR. Legacy is suing him too, claiming he’s meddling in their deal. A judge warned RWR against selling the charter, citing “serious ramifications,” but the plot thickened when Legacy revealed Puchyr was their consultant via his firm, Rucus, with access to sensitive info.

Legacy’s filing pulls no punches, “As part of that agreement, Mr. Puchyr was given access to confidential and sensitive business information so that he could promote Legacy and its principals in order to help Legacy secure (a) sponsorship deal. Legacy trusted Mr. Puchyr.”

They accuse him of betraying that trust, working “behind the scenes to upend Legacy’s deal with RWR” and even making “personal attacks” against co-owner Jimmie Johnson, claiming Johnson “doesn’t understand the deal” and tried to “humiliate Rick publicly.” This legal chaos adds pressure to a team already struggling on track, making Jones’s push for consistency even tougher.